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Milburn challenge to Brown

ALAN MILBURN, the former cabinet minister and close ally of the prime minister, has launched a barely disguised attack on Gordon Brown as tensions over the future direction of the Labour party escalate.

In a move likely to provoke the chancellor and his allies, Milburn suggests that other candidates for the party leadership should come forward to fight Brown because no one figure has a “monopoly on wisdom”.

He also implies that the chancellor could become a John Major-like figure if the “headlong rush” for a change of leadership is not accompanied by new policies.

But his comments contrast with fresh interventions by Jack Straw and Peter Hain, two men vying to become deputy leader of the party. This weekend they launched counterstrikes on Blairite “outriders” such as Milburn and Stephen Byers for jeopardising an orderly transition for Brown.

Writing in The Sunday Times, Milburn warns of “electoral catastrophe” if